


Quarantine feelings

by neverwere



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Time Skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-15
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-22 20:08:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30044064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/neverwere/pseuds/neverwere
Summary: Kitchens are not safe.And it's not the knives or the fire hazards.The lights are too bright, and there's never enough noise, and way too many people wander in and out.
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Comments: 2
Kudos: 36





	Quarantine feelings

**Author's Note:**

> unbeta'd

Kitchens are not safe.

And it's not the knives or the fire hazards. 

The lights are too bright, and there's never enough noise, and way too many people wander in and out.

When you're crying, there's nowhere to hide.

The thought strikes Kiyoomi but it’s already too late, isn’t it? 

When he’s wiping the counter after use and his face trembles and gets hot all over and the tears start free-falling, warm and salty and wet.

Too late.

Homesick, he thinks for the first time.

All because someone left a few pins in a plastic box in the kitchen. 

For the first time in years he remembered the small box of pins that his grandmothers used to keep around. Oval, to fit in a palm. Red plastic bottom, transparent lid. The brand name etched in white, a light texture under the pads of his fingers. The pins, a sharp, silver mass inside. A few colorful heads. In their midst, a piece of tailor’s chalk, small and rounded by use. 

He wonders if everyone’s grandma’s had the same box, if somehow that connects him to every other person out there.

===

Atsumu finds him like that, orange cloth squeezed inside a fist, face half wet. And the sight stops him dead in his tracks, on his way to the kettle.

Kiyoomi freezes too, the back of his hand wiping the corner of his eye. He doesn’t turn towards the approaching footsteps, angles his face away. 

“Omi?” Atsumu says cautiously. 

He walks towards Kiyoomi, a couple more steps.

Kiyoomi’s shoulders start shaking softly as he turns towards the counter, away from Atsumu.

“Hey,” Atsumu says, brushing a tentative hand over the top of Kiyoomi’s arm. 

Kiyoomi seems to shake more. “It’s nothing.” His voice is choked. “I’m okay.”

Atsumu doesn’t say he isn’t. “Omi, it’s fine,” he says very softly, “Can I touch ya?”

Kiyoomi nods. 

Atsumu puts a little more pressure into the touch, spreading his hand on Kiyoomi’s shoulder, rubbing gently. Slowly, he wraps an arm around Kiyoomi’s back. 

“This okay?”

Kiyoomi nods again, still trembling.

“C’me here,” Atsumu murmurs, applying the barest of pressures to turn Kiyoomi around. 

Kiyoomi lets him, lets him get close, lets him cradle his head in his palm and tuck his face in the crook of his neck.

Kiyoomi’s hands go to Atsumu’s hoodie, grabbing it tight. 

Atsumu holds him simply, without questions, like he was meant to hug him all along, like his arms were always the right length and shape to curl around Kiyoomi’s back. 

Kiyoomi’s warm, and his breath is ragged and broken, wet against Atsumu’s collarbone.

“Shall I getcha to yer room?”

Kiyoomi exhales deeply. “Yeah,” he replies, and rubs his hands over his face. After a long moment lifts his head and puts some distance between them. 

He won’t meet Atsumu’s eyes, but Atsumu doesn’t force him, doesn’t chase it. He takes Kiyoomi’s hand and pulls him along, out of the kitchen. 

The wash cloth lays abandoned on the kitchen counter. 

When they reach Kiyoomi’s door, Atsumu steps back, giving him space. 

He’s surprised when Kiyoomi grabs his wrist and whispers “Stay with me,” in a tone that makes his heart break a little.

“Yeah Omi, anythin ya need.”

Kiyoomi doesn’t want much it seems, because he only pulls Atsumu inside and keeps holding his wrist. Neither of them turns on the lights, leaving the apartment in the low glow of dusk.

Atsumu guides Kiyoomi to the sofa and makes him sit down. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

He comes back into the room a few moments later, sits on his haunches in front of Kiyoomi and hands him a glass of water, very cold. Kiyoomi takes the first sip hesitantly, but the following ones are more quick. He puts the glass down on the coffee table and sighs.

Atsumu watches a pair of red-rimmed eyes, and dark eyelashes clumping together like the crown of a painted sun. Instinctively, he brings his fingers to Kiyoomi’s face, but catches himself at the last moment and just hovers a few centimetres away from Kiyoomi’s cheek. He’s about to retract when Kiyoomi turns slightly towards Atsumu’s hand and leans into the touch, closing his eyes. 

Atsumu is not built for tenderness, but in this moment, with warmth flooding his chest through the broken dam of his hand, he wishes he was. 

He leans forward, kneeling, and places the lightest, softest kiss under Kiyoomi’s eye. 

Atsumu feels Kiyoomi’s breath stuttering against his palm, and then Kiyoomi hides in the crook of his neck once again. And once again, Atsumu hugs him, slowly stroking up and down Kiyoomi’s back.

“Ya don’t have to, but if ya wanna talk about it I’ll listen,” he murmurs.

Kiyoomi hums, but doesn’t say anything.

When his knees start to hurt Atsumu asks, “Wanna lie down for a bit?”

Kiyoomi nods, and Atsumu arranges them both on the sofa, with Kiyoomi’s head resting on his chest. For a while it’s only quiet breathing.

“D’ya have a blanket?” he asks Kiyoomi.

Kiyoomi reaches for a basket on the floor, grabs a blanket and covers them both. The way he tucks himself back under Atsumu’s arm, and tugs at the blanket with his feet to stretch it out, drowns Atsumu in fondness.

After a while Kiyoomi speaks. “It’s just— a shit day, one of those.”

Atsumu runs his hand over Kiyoomi’s arm, allowing the silence to stretch.

“I haven’t— haven’t seen my family in months,” Kiyoomi continues.

“I’m sorry Omi, wish I could get ya to Tokyo tonight.”

Kiyoomi sighs. “I’ll survive.”

Atsumu keeps on tracing patterns on Kiyoomi’s shoulder, and wonders when it was that being vulnerable around Kiyoomi stopped scaring him. “I think the first season in the V.League is brutal for everyone. My first year… I wasn’t here actually, I played in Division 2, up in Nagano.” Atsumu swallows, the words are not easy. “Omi… I hated it so much,” he whispers. “I mean, playing was great an’ it was the right choice for me cause I’d never have made the Jackals’ first team straight outta school. But—” A pause. “‘T was tough. Samu got a few late night calls.”

“I played like shit today,” Kiyoomi murmurs in Atsumus’ neck.

“Ya didn’t—”

“Don’t fucking try to pity me. Coach subbed me out halfway through the second set.”

Atsumu sighs. “I know. Ya weren’t in top shape.” Atsumu's hand cards through Kiyoomi's hair in slow, repetitive motions.

“Yeah, I know.”

“Happens to everyone Omi, ya know this. Ya’ve seen it, all of us screw up sometimes. It’s okay. Yer one of the best spikers we’ve got. Yer allowed off days.”

Kiyoomi nudges a foot in between Atsumu’s calves, shuffles a little closer.

“Hav’ya been sleepin okay? Ya looked tired at practice this week.”

Kiyoomi mumbles something intelligible against Atsumu’s shoulder.

“I was comin to find ya earlier cause I was a bit worried.”

“I don’t need your worry.”

“Shut up, everyone needs people to fuss about ‘em. We care y’know? The team. Me. I care ‘boutcha.”

Kiyoomi hums. “I’ve been having trouble sleeping. Sometimes I wake in the middle of the night and I can’t go back to sleep.”

“I think I know what ya mean. ‘S like yer brain doesn’t shut up, keeps on buzzin and buzzin.”

“Yeah.”

“Happens to me sometimes as well. Especially when I’m stressed ‘bout somethin. I get some weird dreams too. It’s an anxiety thing.” Atsumu pauses for a moment, brushing his cheek against Kiyoomi’s hair. “I know the pro athlete job is a lot, an’ bein away from home sucks, an’ ya hafta travel round the country every weekend, an’ the physical stress an’ everythin else. But listen, it gets a little better with time, at least it did for me. Ya get more used to the routine of things, to yer teammates, to this place. Ya know we got yer back right?” 

Kiyoomi doesn’t reply and Atsumu shakes him lightly. “Omi?”

Kiyoomi grunts.

“I mean it. We’re here if ya need anythin alright?”

“Okay.”

“Come to the movie night next time. Shōyō an’ Bokkun always ask me aboutcha.”

“I’ll— think about it.”

“No pressure. It would be nice to have ya there.”

The conversation dies down, and Atsumu feels sleep slowly wrapping around him.

.

.

.

“Atsumu?”

“Yeah?” he mumbles, drowsy.

“Thank you.”

“Anytime Omi, any time.”

Atsumu feels a soft kiss on the skin of his neck before Kiyoomi turns over in his arms and settles with his back against Atsumu’s chest. Atsumu re-adjusts the blanket around them, pulling it up to their shoulders, and presses his nose in the back of Kiyoomi’s head. He smells clean and warm, and his hair tickles Atsumu’s face softly.

“Ya’ll be okay Omi,” he says as he hugs Kiyoomi a little closer, “Ya’ll be okay.”


End file.
